"He's changed."

"She won't change"

"Our lives have changed."

Only in the fairy tales we read as children do the prince and princess meet, fall in love and live happily ever after. Real people mature and change as they experience life and so must relationships if they are to thrive and flourish. Yet change is often difficult. There is a great temptation on the part of couples to want to remain "the way we were." However, in order to achieve our full potential both as individuals and within a love partnership, we must tap our inner resources, seek our dreams and fulfill our promises. If love will not accept a new and challenging future, it dies, escape from life's flow is not possible. Nor is it desirable—for its essence is death. To welcome the future requires accepting change and this change is the substance of life—growth.

Moving forward in a relationship requires time, care and commitment. As two people journey together their needs and goals alter and, with them, the roles each plays in the relationship itself. Thus, the key is open, ongoing communication of positive as well as negative feelings, fear and anger as well as passion and joy. Time for intimate sharing of confidence, attention to emotional and sexual needs, caring gestures and verbal appreciation contribute much to sustaining a close union. Only if both partners are free as the years pass to continue to express their feelings and needs can they sustain a mutually meaningful relationship which remains beautiful and vital.

At the very core of such a relationship is its sexual/emotional union. When both partners are at ease in releasing their deepest, most spontaneous feelings in the passion of a profound physical and emotional consummation they achieve a spiritual connection which continually enriches and fulfills them. The richest reward of caring, enduring sex comes because both people can trust in the genuineness of the passion expressed. It is real. Illusions are not necessary. True needs and desires are constantly being communicated, acted upon and fulfilled. Each partner shares his or her inner world by exposing it, by expressing it and by making the other person part of its reality.

Since both people can release their deepest, most intimate feelings to their loved ones, each is free to grow and the other person is an essential part of that creative process. Life for such a couple is a rewarding adventure in which their relationship becomes fuller, their intimacy deepens, and their sexual bonding perpetually affirms each other's work. In such an atmosphere, changes can take place as they are required by alterations of circumstances or needs. If the union created is a living thing, the many colors and qualities of the participants gradually unfold and open. The process itself regenerates the creative energy and love of each individual for the other and, in so doing, the mutual illumination transforms the two people. Their inner and outer horizons interface and enlarge. Together, they create a life where each is somehow more real, more tender, more human, and so each is able to give more, to share more with others.

Keeping a love relationship vital is what this book is all about. In order that this goal be achievable, realistic, and worthwhile, certain qualities and attitudes are needed:

Open, ongoing communication and self-disclosure.

The freedom for each partner and the relationship to grow and change.

Renewal, rekindling and expansion of sexual sensitivity to each other's needs and desires.

Negotiation and compromise to solve sexual/emotional differences.

Commitment to a lasting relationship.

Making love last is a challenge for it involves a vital conflict: our need for permanence and our need for growth. These two elements are part of the human condition. To fight against them is to fight the life force itself. Only if we embrace the limits of our existence can we attain that natural marriage which we seek. And such a union answers a profound human need to share the breadth and scope of one life with another, to encourage and be part of each other's desires and dreams. When this occurs new visions are born—the blending of the creative potential of two unique individuals expands the boundaries of each so that it produces not only enriched selves but an enriched world.